Marreucos (Morocco)

It's been a while, but hey!!

I went to Morocco last weekend. It was definitely different than anywhere I'd ever been before. We went to Tangiers, Assilah, Chefchaouen, and Tetuan. Chefchaouen was my favorite, it was a very pretty city with high mountains surrounding it. Also, the whole city was blue (you'll see in the pics)! It was very very pretty. I got to ride a camel, see a lot of pretty sights, and eat some good food while in Morocco. Definitely a great experience.

Friday

We left on Friday at 5P by bus from Sevilla. I went with a travel agency called DiscoverSevilla (not about to venture into Africa on my lonesome) and they did a great job planning the trip for us. We had a three hour bus ride to the strait of Gibraltar (at Tarifa), then an hour long ferry ride across the strait, then we were in Tangiers! We got to our hotel around 10:30P. It was really nice, with a big dining room (which was where we ate all of our dinners and breakfasts for the trip).

Our hotel

Bus, notice writing on left side of photo

The first night we had a delicious dinner, and after dinner a medicine man came to the hotel and had some things for sale. He gave this big presentation of all of the stuff and how to use it. It was really interesting. He had special teas, stuff for your hair, stuff to cure wrinkles and stretch marks, "Jiggy Jiggy" which is an oil that is supposed to act as an aphrodiziac (ooooh la la). He was quite the character, and very interesting to listen to.

Salad, with corn, beets, tomatos, potatoes, and an egg (topped with mayo stuff, wasn't crazy about that stuff, but otherwise, very good!)

Couscous with a bunch of stuff, I don't know what most of it was, I think it was all veggies, chicken, and some nuts (I think almonds)

After dinner, I headed upstairs and went to bed.

Saturday

Saturday we got up early and went to the Caves of Hercules. They were really pretty caves next to the shore.

Stop sign

Inside the caves

Inside the caves

After that it was camel-riding time! Idk the normal way of riding a camel, but the way we did it was that you get on the camel when it's laying down, and then the camel stands up with you on it. And - I didn't really realize this - but camels are freaking tall! It turns out they are not graceful when they stand up. So it pretty much feels like a roller coaster, which really just added to the excitement.

Me, Linds, camel

Gotta show love for the gators. Me, Kaley, camel, Marcela

After the camel ride, we drove to Assilah, had lunch, and had 2 hours to ourselves, where we could go shopping or whatever. Shopping choices were pretty limited, but it was a fun time. I got a henna tattoo, because, why not? 

Watching The Office on the bus, loved it.

Love the writing

Arabic Coke.

Under all those fries (which tasted like the ones in the US) was delicious chicken. 

For dessert. The apple tasted a lot like a pear, delicious!

Where we ate.

Getting Henna in Assilah

In Assilah

Teeny teeny kitty :)

Love the signs! Such a pretty language

After Assilah, we headed back to our hotel, and had a good dinner in the hotel dining room. After dinner, there was karaoke in the hotel's bar, so I decided to sing "All My Loving" by the Beatles. Sending all my loving to all you wonderful people! :D

Soup. Don't ask me what was in it, because I honestly couldn't tell you. Noodles? That's about as far as I get. It was very yummy.

SO yummy. But not that different from ice cream cakes in the US.

We spent a few hours at karaoke, then I headed upstairs to get some sleep before our last day in Morocco.

Sunday

Sunday was my favorite day in Morocco. We spent a lot of the day on the bus, but I felt like we got to see a lot of stuff. We drove out to Tetuan and went on a driving tour with a Moroccan man, who told us a lot about life in Morocco and Islam. We drove on winding roads through the Rif Mountains (who knew Africa had mountains? I sure didn't.) We watched Aladdin while we drove (how appropriate?) and I was reminded of how much I love that movie.

Then we stopped in the city center of Tetuan and went on a short walking tour. We got to see the outside of a palace, it was pretty cool. We had to go with a police escort, which made me kind of sad (why can't we all just get along?) but I understand it.

Moroccan flags

We also had the chance to drive to a pretty look-out point in the mountains.

Kaley, me, Katie, Gaby, Marcela, Lindsey, Andrea

Roomie love

Look, we're the same height! :)

After that we drove to Chefchaouen, the blue city! The winding streets and walls of this city are painted blue. Some said it was to eliminate flies, some said it was for the heat, others said it was out of respect for the Jewish inhabitants. I'm not sure what the reason was, but it was really pretty. We had lunch at a place called Aladdin, and then went on a walking tour of the city. After the tour, we were given 30 minutes to do quick shopping. I wished we had had longer to shop there, there were a lot of cool shops that I would have liked to check out. But that's okay :)

Where we had lunch

Me and Linds at lunch

Salads with rice and potatoes. And bread. Lots of bread.

More fries with chicken and rice.

We were taking a group photo, and some Moroccan kids decided they wanted to join us. It was cool!

Adorable! I thought it was really cute how the kids started doing "bunny ears" on the Americans. And they really liked that guy they're jumping onto, Idk why. 

Pensive kitty.

Doggies

After that, we headed back to Tangiers (and thus, the strait). We had another ferry ride across the strait and a 3 hour ride to Sevilla, and then we were back. We got back on Sunday night at 2A (so, Monday morning?).

I had an amazing time in Morocco. It was eye-opening in a lot of ways, made me really appreciate living in the United States. When we went on our long drives through the mountains, we drove through some areas with remote and rundown houses that, I'm sure, did not have running water. The areas were just a lot less developed than what I'm used to. Makes you really appreciate life in the United States.

I loved the Arabic writing. I thought it looked so pretty. And, as you saw, I took a lot of pictures of it.

 We were driving around in two big coach buses, and we attracted a lot of attention. Some of the Moroccan kids (mainly male teenagers) actually gave us the middle finger when we drove by. It was sad to see that much hate, but maybe as much as we have stereotypes about life in Africa (and namely, an Arab country) they have stereotypes about Americans. Several times, when we were driving, Moroccan kids would jump onto the back of our bus and hang on for a while.

Our tour leader, Tobah, was very good at handling them. At one point, I asked Tobah if the kids hitching a ride on the bus was normal, and if he knew why they did it. I assumed they just didn't want to pay for a city bus or they were just messing around (you know, boys will be boys, right?). Tobah said those are possible, but he said that from what he's seen, it's that the Moroccan kids think we're going to the Tangiers (and thus, the border with Spain) and want to sneak out of Morocco. Whether that's true or just a guess, I don't know. But it made me realize more how different life is in this country, or any developing country, for that matter. And I am thankful to be able to called the United States my home.